Monday, October 12, 2009

New animation update!I received A LOT of feedback on my update last week. I forgot how wonderful it was to share animation and discuss it with others. I am still trying to get over the "it is not perfect so I don't want to show it to the public yet" mentality.This week's update is actually in worse shape "polish"-wise but in better shape planning-wise. Based on all the feedback I received last week I completely redid some poses and removed the non-essential gestures. As such there are a lot of "pops" and some ugly arcs in this shot, but I feel like the animation is in a better place and will be even better as I polish it this week:

Some of the changes from last week:

Early pose is straighter, "rashly" pose is held longer

Hips move throughout the entire piece ("don't forget the hips!"), I may have pushed them too far in some places, but it is better than not using them enough

Hands move less and took out needless poses around upper chest. Dropped unused hand to side of body. Still need to polish the fingers more and fix some IK'ness

Emphasized important syllables. I tried to restrain myself when blocking them as one of the biggest mistakes in lip sync is to focus on every syllable. By avoiding this I ended up not emphasizing the important ones.

Head overlaps spine even more.

Really pushed the spine C curves before "plague". My poses weren't as strong as they could have been.

Added frantic looking during "havoc and chaos", still needs polish and head arc control but it is getting there

Had character jump at the end and feel less "rooted" to the ground. Final pose is pushed even further.

Here is the previous shot for comparison:

I still need to focus on the "why me" and confused/angry sections of the piece, I have lots to do before Sunday!